I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.
Today, I am reading and commenting on Deuteronomy 27-28.
Moses instructed the Israelites that when they crossed over into the Promised Land they were to set up half the people on Mt Gerizim and half the people on Mt Ebal. Those on Mt Gerizim would declare a blessing on the people while those on Mt Ebal would declare a curse. The blessing would be those the people would receive if they followed God’s commands and the curse they would receive if they did not. Then the Levites would call out to the people a list of things which would bring a curse on the people and the people were to acknowledge that they had heard.
Moses then told the people the blessing they would receive for following God’s commands and the curses they would receive for disobeying them. The blessings and curses were (and are) reciprocal to each other. I am convinced that these blessings and curses are the natural (and by natural I mean that is the way God designed the world to work) results of following, or not following, the commands which God has given. If you do the things which the Levites declared would result in a person being cursed in the first part of this passage, the results are likely to be unpleasant. While a single individual who does a limited number of those things may never realize the harm they bring, a people who does even one of them as common practice will experience the curses listed. The more a people does any one of these items the more likely they are to embrace all of these cursed behaviors.